Indian Quilts

As you know, I got to spend some quality time with my stitching stuff on airplanes, including the newest issue of Piecework. Gee whiz, you'd think that it wouldn't take 8 years of teaching composition for a person to be able to tell what makes bad reading. There's an article on Indian quilts, that while informative, just sucks. About 3/4 of the way through the list that passes as an article, the writer begins discussing Chinese, Indonesian, and Southeast Asian quilts. What, all Asians look alike to her? About three paragraphs later she explains that Indian fabric is used by all of those other countries. What an effective transition! Too bad she didn't know where to put it. My friend AC, an Indian, says she also likely misused the word "Hindustani." His word's enough for me.

The magazine has done a redesign, and unlike the last one, it's pretty easy on the eyes. Lots of white space, and truth be told it looks like they are wanting for content; I mean how many pages does a magazine need for letters to the editor? And they practically beg for story and project ideas. Nevertheless . . . There are a couple of new features: one that shows how to "preserve the spirit" of an old textile, but if you needed a magazine article to tell you to make an old quilt into a stuffed toy, you need a lot more than just a magazine. How far are they going to be able to go with that? We'll see . . .month after month. The other new article is a portrait of "someone who has made a difference in the world of needlework." They started with Erica Wilson; okay, so they took that made (past tense) very seriously. The final "new" column will be rerunning a bunch of old patterns. I love that crap (cf: Better Homes and Gardens project recycling). The only mag that's ever done this sort of thing successfully was an old McCall's craft mag, and they re-ran patterns from before I was born. Now that's what I'm talking about! Finally, there's going to be a little pattern used as an icon throughout. It seems like it will change in each issue. A person might be able to make an interesting little sampler from them. But we'll have to see how the other ones look.

For the card makers out there, I learned an interesting technique last night. Stamp on white paper and copy it onto a plastic sheet. Color in different areas with glue, apply fine glitter, wait 20-30 seconds, repeat. In the interest of fairness to the instructor, there's a step I left out--a way to avoid static cling. At any rate, you use the creation plastic side up for cards, etc. I've already been playing around with clip art and different places to put it. It was fun, I should get out of the house more!

Well, that was an adventure!

I didn't expect to be so long getting back here. I was stuck in San Francisco an extra day because of the fires in Southern California. While my apartment is not in any danger, the air traffic controllers were, and everything got shut down on Sunday. Much was back up on Monday--of course, we had to fly on a different airline and into Orange County about 40 minutes south of where we expected to end up. Oh, and we had to wait an extra 1.5 hours on the runway before we could take off. Everyone was well behaved except for the Big Idiot sitting behind us who doesn't think the U.S. should be brought in to help pay for the bazillion dollars in damages because the fires are "local." But mostly I could tune out her yammering.

At any rate, the hotel didn't have a yellow pages, so I couldn't find any cool stitching stores to check out. I did, however, manage to get us to the Asian Art Museum for a quick look before the wedding. I saw some lovely Korean wrappers (patchwork fabric giftwrap) and some Tibetan weaving. I like seeing textiles in museums. I am a sucker for it. I once spent an hour looking at a (as in one) needle casket in the V&A. I only moved on because there was more needlework to see.

I worked on the sampler for the Dude on the planes and in our downtime. "When in love I do commence, may it be with a man of sense." Whenever I tell him he's silly, he says, in his very serious English voice, "No I'm not; I'm sensible." So in addition to being cotton for our second anniversary (last July), it's very apropos. I love the colors as well, and it's on Meadowlark fabric from R&R. FABULOUS mottling in pinky-peach and blues on a greeny-gold.

I'm going to a card making workshop at the scrapbook store with Sissy tonight. I'm never going to finish this afghan, am I?

The Chapter on Whales

I'm in a bit of a mood. I haven't been stitching. I reorganized the scrapbook materials on Tuesday because my husband asked if we had "to have all this crap all over the place." Mostly he's a good guy and he understands my need for crap all over the place. But it took me some time to put into place a new filing system for 8.5x11 papers and all scraps. It'll do until I have my fantasy craft room. It would be a whole room that would have big windows, and two comfy chairs with ottomans (because my legs are short and no comfy chairs are ever short enough). Two, so stitchy friends could visit. Then I'd have bookcases for all my craft books and also my giant binders with my cross-stitch booklets. I'd have a nice big closet for the yarn and fabric stash. Maybe the room could be lined with bookcases and the yarn and fabric could be stored on them in lined baskets. There'd be a section to keep all the 12x12 paper flat--like in stores. And a big work table. I'm not sure if I want it waist-high or chair height. Two tables! And I'd never have to pick up after myself or take my cross-stitch projects off the edge of the chair or ... or... or... That'd be nice. What's your craft room fantasy? Are you living it? Maybe you should e-mail me instead of using this stupid comments feature I can't read.

I had to send off the knitted goods to England, so on Wednesday I finished the baby's hat.

On Thursday, I played hookie--I was sick of going to work--and ran errands all day and cleaned my kitchen and packed because we are off to San Fran this weekend for a wedding at Grace Cathedral. I'm wicked excited to get out of Dodge, but I find it deeply troubling that I have put aside the afghan for so long. And for this weekend too. It's just too big when we're carrying everything on with us. I did bring a couple of UFOs: Carriage House Samplings's "Hearts and Flowers" which I almost finished in time for my "cotton anniversary" and Bent Creek's "Wooly Zipper" which I bought to do on this kind of trip. There may be one or two more little projects tucked in the bag, but no scissors. After a heart-wrenching moment in the Tulsa airport, I am meticulous about scissors. Will that hold you until Monday?

Where does the time go?

I began a new square on the afghan; this one is a hydrangea. The backstitching on this is going to be a bitch because every one of those tiny flowerettes that make up the snowball of a hydrangea flower has to be backstitched. Ugh. On the happy side of things, I calculated that this design should only take about 27 hours which means one hour of stitching per night during the week and two on weekends, and I should finish on schedule. Of course, I calculated that on Friday night.

On Saturday, my sister came over to use my scrapbooking supplies and since the materials were all over the dining table, I did a couple of pages. And she got me a gift certificate for the scrapbooking store, so I had to go spend that. I have absolutely finished my honeymoon album--that one just had two pictures that needed to be blown up and put in. Then I started in earnest on our cross-country drive in 1993. Of course, while the stuff's all out I want to work on that, and I did on Sunday too. I also got a significant portion of last Christmas's photos done for my aunt--this was her birthday gift. Scrapping is just another distraction at this point--I've got to plug away on the afghan. I promise to put all the stuff away tonight. And I'll do the hydrangea while I watch Monday Night Football, or not depending on how badly the Chiefs slaughter the Raiders. Can I make up 4 hours lost in one night?

This is where I want to be

As I'd hoped, I have begun backstitching the gladiolus, and will definitely finish this square tonight, on schedule. I will then begin--oh gosh, I haven't kitted the floss, so I don't even know what the next flower is. Whatever it is, it will need to be finished by November 7th.

I will also, happily, send off presents to my mil, fil, sil&bil this weekend. I think bil, sil and the boys' gifts will have to wait until the end of the month. This is still months earlier than we mailed their gifts last year (um, February?). I have to finish two little boy hats and decorate sweatshirts. Last year's appliqued santa sweatshirt was a big hit with Geo, so I've got to make another one. I hope to also send Best Man's baby's present that weekend. Chiara was born in May and I think I completed her Wee Baby sampler in June. Unfortunately, I forgot it was Sampler Threads and handwashed it. It ran claret all over the design. I had to soak it for about a week to get most of the color out. Because this happened in Los Angeles in the summer, it was impossible to keep the water cold, so while we were off at work, the whole shebang went into the frigo. I still have to mount it into the box I bought ages ago. But I am traumatized by the whole incident. Stupid stitching. (Always best to put the blame where it lies, with the inanimate object.)

One of my dear friends from high school just had a (first) baby. This is rather late in life (I just turned 37). I feel the urge to knit something. But I have too much on my plate right now with the English gifts and the afghan. But it wouldn't take that long to knit a little baby hat. Oh, I should, shouldn't I? Okay, you talked me into it. (Talking me out of it is strongly encouraged.)

I also had a chance to look at some of Long Dog's pieces--can't remember where I read about them, but somewhere out there. I'm sending you to the Wyndham Needleworks site to look at them because 1) if you're American, you can buy them there and 2) I think the images are better. I'm loving "Piggy in the Middle" and "Day and Night." If the Dude manages to get his film made, I'll also have to do "Time and Tide Wait for No Man." That's a big IF. I should stop with the "stuff" lust too, because I have enough to do. After I finish this afghan, I want to get some of my UFOs (about 20) completed--or at least have a manageable pile of 3-4 projects going. Then I can think about Long Dog.

teaching others to stitch

I am making slow and steady progress on the afghan in the post-dinner hours, but little reports on this without the assistance of visual aids is getting boring, I think. So I am going to tell you about my trip to Poland in 1998.

I went to teach English as a Second Language to high school students with The Kosciuszko Foundation; I ended up in Tczew [t-cheff], about an hour south of Gdansk. The coolest thing about this area was that it was held by Teutonic Knights from 1308-1466. It passed to Russia in 1772 and was back in Polish hands just after WWI. The students came from all over Poland. Most came to Tczew because it was the closest they would ever be to the sea. And we did spend some time in Sopot and Gdynia for them.

Each day I taught English from 9:00-12:00. Two days a week, I also had to lead two extra-curricular activities. I chose crafts. It was difficult to bring along materials for too many activities so I focused on cross-stitch and crazy quilting. The trip organizer promised me that the students would be proficient needleworkers. Sue Stokes of the Nutmeg Needle gave me chart packs of one of her lacis designs (defintely for intermediates), a fabric company gave me the cuts I needed for the design, and DMC gave me the floss. Also, many wonderful rctn'ers sent me extra fabric, floss, and hoops. I also brought along two "two hour stitching" books. So I set off armed with my knowledge and three pairs of scissors.

You know something's got to go wrong, right? Well, everyone--including the Polish teachers--wanted to learn Sue's piece. And no one had ever held a needle. So here I am, on my first afternoon of teaching the extracurriculars, with about 35 students and 25 chartpacks. I naively ask how many have stitched before. No hands. I tell them they'll have to learn some basics before I will give them the chart, and that they'll have to commit to three weeks in the class. Only a couple decline. I rush back to my room, thankful that someone sent me two yards of 22 count fabric. I "rexo" (xerox--bad I know, but I was desperate) the "ABC" from the chart so everyone has one. We spend the first week with them learning the ABC. After a few hours, about 1/3 of the class--and all the Polish teachers--can't believe how little progress they made. Many drop. I end up with plenty of chartpacks, but still too few scissors.

The wonderful thing about teenagers (and there is something!) is that they don't have the attitude that they can't: don't want to, definitely; but can't, not so much. So, twenty or so young women show up dutifully for three weeks. They all learn how to do each of the steps. They all get the grid for the lacis wrapped. Many of them decide to skip the last day to go to the pool, but they all get to the finishing point. And one girl completes the whole design. I have the best picture of her--she's so proud.

Others were interested in learning, but not in spending three weeks engaged in one project. So I teach another class on smaller projects. I choose three designs out of the "Two Hour" books I brought, regraph them, xerox them [nb: I really don't advocate this, but there was nothing! nothing! else I could do.] and hand them to my dozen or so students. The only trouble they give me is that I have to remind them to ask for the scissors in English. Many resort to making clipping motions with their fingers to avoid it. A couple of students get really into it and borrow the book. The rummage through the floss and fabric and make the designs using the colors they like. It's very refreshing.

On the last day in camp, my duties are over, so I hightail it to Gdansk with some of the other teachers for McDonald's. I know it's disgusting, but sometimes it feels like home. Especially after you've been so disconnected from your own language. The saddest part is that one of the girls who has borrowed the book has a present for me. She leaves before I get back. She's made a trio of teddy bears and has my name below it. I tear up just thinking about it. I can't believe I wasn't there to receive such a fabulous gift.

SEX and the single girl

Two packages arrived at my door yesterday. An order from the Stitchery--who provide so many of the Sandy Cozzolino santas that I do--and from Amazon. I don't know how I managed it, well, I know precisely how I managed, but I got two Santa kits from the Stitchery and one is one that I just received from the Needle Arts catalog. D'oh. I'm going to have to make a checklist of those kits so that I can keep track. The problem is that I've missed a few that I've wanted to get in the past and now I am obsessed with collecting them all. And because our apartment has no storage, there are some under the bed, some next to my stitching chair and some in the "craft closet." Perhaps I have plenty of storage space, and should simply have less stuff. But am I that ready to be unAmerican?

I also got the knitting book "Monkeysuits" by Sharon Turner. The stuff is incredibly adorable and not baby-ish; in fact it's downright stylish. I'm in love with the cover design "Tweedy Pie;" I also am quite fond of "Jacky-Oh," "Puppy Love," "Swedish pancakes," "Snow Suit" [because I too have an un-requited desire to own a muff that stems from childhood], "Fall Colors," "Checkered Past," and "Boxed Set." Some of the stuff looks like it was designed by Mary Engelbreit, but at the same time the Dude approved of the stuff and asked why people didn't make such attractive designs for adults. I envision a future of much knitting for my neices and nephews.

I did more on the afghan last night. But this is the area where some of the flowers run into each other and it's not easy to say how much I have done or have left to do. I'll let you know when I start the backstitching--I'm hoping for Thursday.

Did you miss me?

I've finished my fil's scarf. I don't know why I thought I could cross-stitch a full-sized afghan in the front seat of a Civic. There's just too much fabric! So I knit for 5 hours on the way up (got dark before we got there, and I am not the kind of knitter who can knit in the dark). I knitted a bit in the sports book at Paris while betting on horses. I bet that's a first. Maybe not; you see everything in Vegas, don't you? Then another few hours on the way home. I'm now knitting little hats for my nephews on my commute.

While watching Monday Night Football, I finished a flower and the bud. So I am left with 3 flowers and some backstitching to complete by Friday.

SoCal, NoCal and the rest of Cal.

I didn't get any stitching done last night as I was rushing about getting ready to head for Vegas, which I will do in about an hour. I need fun and relaxation because it's going to be a long 3 years.

I can read comments in a wicked old version of Netscape, but not in the fairly recent Explorer. I can't respond in Netscape, so I'll just write my responses here. I'm sure this happens to people in a lot of segments of California but Lynn thought I should like Arnie because he lives about 20 minutes from me. But there are liberals in SoCal, as amy! pointed out. Maybe it's because amy! and I were PhD students together, but we've met a few of them in our day. Santa Monica is usually referred to as the People's Republic of SM; it's Berkeley with nicer beaches. Los Angeles is emphatically not Orange County. And L.A. has Hollywood for goodness sake; we know how liberal they are. But in case you don't believe me, check it out:Recall Map; Los Angeles County is that little sea of red. The numbers weren't as high as Sanfran, but c'mon, Arnold lives down here. And we still voted against the recall. Hate to end on another downer. . .

four flowers and a bud

I managed to complete the backstitching on the gladiolus leaves. And I took five stitches on the first flower. This means just four flowers and a bud left to stitch.

I also knitted up a swatch for fil's scarf, just to be sure I liked the colors and they were 'masculine' enough. The yarn has very rich autumn colors which should go with a camel coat beautifully.

Stash arrived at the door. The Sandy Cozzolino perforated santas and the beautiful shaker box that has a sampler lining to hold scissors. The box is perfect, and I am looking forward to stitching with the silks. I hope I can find time to squeeze it in because I'd like it to be finished before my trip to Tulsa. I really wanted to remember the designer, but apparently I can't hold things in my head on the half hour commute to work. The design is from Georgia. It's nice to know that you can't go to your LNS and find everything--otherwise what would be the use of travel?

hell in a handbasket

Well, here we are. Governor "Tongue-in-the-[Anus]" Schwarzenegger. It doesn't have anything to do with me, folks. I was going to say that you didn't come here for this kind of rant because stitching is pretty apolitical, but that's not true on two counts. First, stitching has been used as a political tool in the past, and can be yet again. Needleworkers of the world, unite! You have nothing to lose but your [insert something clever here]! I highly recommend Roszika Parker's book The Subversive Stitch for more on the political uses of stitching. Perhaps more importantly, the comments feature got used to ask what the hell is going on in California. Well, Laran was nicer than that. [A note on the comments feature. It's gone buggy and I seem to be the only person who can't read it, but I think that's because the office hasn't updated Explorer or Netscape in a hound's age. I've got someone helping me out with it all though.]

I can't explain California's election. On one hand, the process of being able to recall an elected official is a pretty good one; direct democracy and all that. OTOH, being able to buy signatures isn't what they had in mind back in the 19th century when they decided direct democracy was a good thing. I think having a direct election--no primary, no run-off--is way stupid. But let us turn to the new governor. Personally, I think he won't be able to correct California's troubles. It's systemic and nationwide. Do people think that they've elected the Terminator, someone who can make it all all right at the end of 180 minutes? I'm not sure; some probably did. Do I think they're going to wake up in about 6 months and say, "hey, he's got no platform and he sexually harasses women?" Um, you betcha. I think it's going to be Clarence Thomas meets Jesse Venutra all over. But what do I know? I really thought the recall wouldn't go through because people would be disgusted that $2M from some businessman means that we spend $70M to have an election...

It took me about 20 minutes to vote although there was a long line. So I was able to go buy the yarn for my fil's scarf (he finally told me the color of his coat). Now I can begin it on the ride to Vegas, baby (hey, when your world goes straight to hell, you really need an escape--booze, bright lights, sex, gambling, everything). As a result of all this activity, I spent only an hour last night backstitching the gladiolus while watching "my murders"--that's what the Dude calls The New Detectives. But I've got all the outlining stitches done, just have to do a little bit of the detail on the leaves.

Now I've got to write a letter to the Jo-Ann's in Santa Monica. They have no lights in their parking lot. A store mainly for women with women employees, and there are no lights! That's a kidnap-rape-murder waiting to happen. Oh, happy post.

How about them Sox?

I didn't get nearly the stitching done that I usually do during Monday Night Football. First, the Dude needed to watch the baseball (he's hoping for a Sox-Cubs World Series), and we've only got the one television. The first half of the Colts-Bucs was so boring, I couldn't be bothered to switch back and forth, so I went grocery shopping. When I returned, the Sox game was so electrifying, I didn't stitch. When that was over, it was back to the unbelievably exciting fourth quarter of the football. I could hardly look down at my work. So just a few backstitches last night.

When I get home tonight, I must go vote. I'm hoping for short lines. Then I've got errands, so I'm not sure I'll get to stitch tonight either. Cubs or no Cubs.

Progress Report

I so enjoy looking at everyone's progress on their projects that I might upgrade so I can post pictures too. I got a lot done this weekend on the gladiolus-freesia. All of the leaves and stalks are complete. And I have even begun backstitching. No, I wasn't bad; I just decided that if I wasn't so bored that I had to start stitching the flowers, I should get some backstitching done while I had the energy, instead of leaving it all to the end like on Gallica. I also made four cards with my sister-the-stamper. That took up most of Sunday evening, but I'm very pleased with the work I've done.

I have confined my knitting to the commute to and from work. It seems that I will be done my bil's scarf well before the mid-October mailing deadline. This leaves me with the two small hats and my fil's scarf. He hasn't told me what color his winter coat is, so I may opt out and go buy him something instead. The little boys' hats should take me just an afternoon. And on Friday, it looks like we'll be driving to Vegas so that ought to give me plenty of time!

I can't believe I may make all my deadlines this month!

You're out there!

I haven't done a google search on needlework blogs since I started writing this. Before then, I checked obsessively. I guess I just figured you'd let me know you were out there. So I went blithely along thinking that a!sh, mb, bmh, and st were my only readers. Now it turns out I am on people's lists. Who knew? You didn't tell me! I didn't go through all the trouble of figuring out comments software for nothing people! You don't have to leave your e-mail address if you don't want to.

Anyway, this brought up a conversation elsewhere, and I just want to correct a misperception. Dragon Dreams designs are very pretty, but I was just not thrilled with her ornaments. "O Holey Knight," while a delightful pun, was a low-point.

But I am the Stitch Bitch and WYSIWYG. I can't go all soft now.

I found a way to take out a minimal number of stitches to make the correction on the Gladiolus-Freesia. I made some record progress on it as well. The stalks are almost done, and I've begun work on some leaves. I have to keep at it so I can get through these huge sections with just 3 colors (boring). When I begin to go completely out of my mind with boredom, I'll start the flowers. And when I'm bad, I'll punish myself with backstitching--because I still have to backstitch parts of Gallica. Ugh.

So you'll see some new people on the website. I'm going to be a bit strict about how much you have to write about needlework to be included. As lovely as your children/spouses/houses/knitting (are/is), I'm looking for blogs that focus. Don't be shy to tell me that you're out there!

Why do I have to title everything?

I think the bloom is off the rose. I think about writing here, but then I am so bored with stitching the afghan that talk about stitching just makes me anxious that I am falling further and further behind. I took my own advice and started the Gladiolus-Freesia. I'm not sure why she hyphenated this one; it's definitely two flowers, although in the picture you really can't tell the difference. Maybe she drew one and people thought it looked like the other. At any rate, I've made a mistake already and I can't find it. I'm only working with three shades of green so far, all very close, so at some points, it's really difficult to tell what the fuck I've done. It is way too soon for me to feel this way about a project.

Do you get that? You get to the point in a project and you hate it? I have two: a wedding sampler I did for my cousin and a rooster I was doing for my mother. On the wedding sampler, a bride and groom are surrounded by bushes and trees. There must have been about 40 different greens including blended needles in that one. I thought my head would explode. That's where we came up with Stitch n' Bitch which was going to be the name of our store before the knitters came along and adopted it for their gatherings. Whenever I'd take out the sampler, everyone would say, "here comes the stitch n' bitch." The other project, although a rooster, got to be known as the frickin' chicken. In that one, I started from two sides and it didn't meet in the middle. Trying to figure out which parts to "just skip" and still make the frickin' chicken look like a rooster was a right bitch. And then my mother went and changed her dining room so the rooster doesn't match it any more. She does have chickens in the kitchen, so someday it might get done. I probably have less than ten hours left on that. I should just do it.